I refer to your post, [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] and will like to find out from you based on the research you have done, when was the approximate months/season in 1980 / 1981 when Canadian and UK toy shops for figures on these specific cardbacks:

Sorry for the late reply to this, I know you have been asking for a while. Busy man at the moment so I haven't had chance to catch up with a lot of things.

As for the question, I wouldn't really know the time line of the release of the cards in question, however a little bit of common sense and logic can roughly deduce this to a certain extent.

Here is what we know.....

The Empire Strikes Back was released in theatres nationwide on the 21st of May 1980

The first ESB Character figures appeared on the 31a & 31B in the U.S.A, 31A & 31B in Canada and 30A & 30B in the United Kingdom

One thing for certain is that the U.S. 31A & 31B cards where released before the film hit cinemas, we know this because the 32nd figure was Yoda and his appearance was kept from the public until the film came out.It's likely that these cards where released at the same time and a month or so before the film was released. It is also likely that the the Canadian 31a & 31b and the Palitoy 30A where released before the film hit cinemas.

The 32 backs in both the U.S. and Canada would have probably been released just after the film was released because the only additional character was Yoda which had now been released.It.s slightly harder to establish the time release of the Palitoy 30B but it is likely that this came out at a similar time after the film was released.

The 41 Backs featured the second wave of figures, these would have most likely been released several months after the film was released. The 41A was indepent and then the 41B & 41C where most likely released together as was the 41D & 41EThe Canadian release would have also most likely been at a similar time.As for Palitoy again it's difficult to say. The 41 backs in the U.K. probably didn't coiside with the U.S. releases, most likely came slightly after. The 30B Palioty cards can be found with the second wave of ESB characters on them which would suggest that the 30B was still been used when the second wave was released. The scarcity of the 30B cards, particularly with the second wave on suggests that production of these figures on these cards was probably not very long and was replaced by the 41 backs.

My guess would be that all of these cards where released before the end of 1980 so somewhere between May and December. Other than that I wouldn't really say a specific month was too important really.

Thank you for your response. It seems that identifying the approximate release dates especially for the Palitoy ESB 30B and the subsequent Palitoy ESB 41 back releases is not an easy task after all.

There is a thread titled [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.], which I will call upon the SWFUK forum member concerned to see whether he has some of the answers to these same of questions.